


biting the hand that feeds you (will not be tolerated)

by sladeninstitute



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, M/M, Protective Bones, Rescue Missions, Verbal Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-27
Updated: 2014-02-27
Packaged: 2018-01-13 22:59:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1243723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sladeninstitute/pseuds/sladeninstitute
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After some bumps in the road turn a crowd against Captain Kirk, the ship's CMO (and the captain's boyfriend) stands up and has some things to day.</p>
            </blockquote>





	biting the hand that feeds you (will not be tolerated)

**Author's Note:**

> Written in response to captainkirkmccoy's prompt: "Can you write me some protective!Bones? Maybe Bones has to deal with the survivors of some tragedy that the Enterprise helped with and they all got separated and Jim’s hurt and the survivors are giving him a hard time and don’t trust the young captain and Bones tells them straight while worrying for him?"

“You haven’t helped us at all!” cries one member of the crowd.

“Yeah!”

“You’ve not done a damn thing! Why should we trust you?”

“A meteor hit our settlement and all you’ve done is move us out here to the middle of a damn field! What good is that? You were supposed to transport us up to your ship!”

The crowd continues on with their whirlwind of verbal abuse, all of it directed at Jim. Who, by all rights, is about the best damn man that Bones knows. The verbal abuse is completely unfounded, and Bones won’t stand for it. His jaw is twitching by the time the crowd dies down. It looks like Jim’s about to open his mouth to start rebutting half the statements thrown at him, but Bones steps in and pushes him (gently) aside.

 

“Don’t y’all know better than to bite the damn hand that’s feedin’ ya?!” Bones starts, practically shouting right back at the crowd. It’s a simple question that he lets sink in with the crowd.

He casts a glance back at Jim, worried for the kid’s mental health at the moment. Criticism is something that Jim knows how to handle, but a full scale verbal assault from an entire crowd like this is a different story entirely. He knows Jim well enough to know that he won’t cry here, won’t show a lick of emotion, but part of him is expecting tears once this is all said and done. He can just imagine Jim crawling into bed with him that night and opening the floodgates. If there aren’t any tears, there’s at least going to be a new flood of self-doubt and self-flagellation. It’s enough to get Bones all fired up at the crowd, moreso than he’d been when he’d started speaking.

“This captain, this  _man_ has come here to help you! You say that your planet’s in the middle of a crisis, and the first thing he wants to do is help!” Bones pauses to collect his thoughts, but is right back to chastising the crowd immediately.

“Did you know that we didn’t have to come here? Starfleet could’ve sent any number of ships to come and help your ungrateful selves, but no. Captain Kirk fought Starfleet Command for the privilege of helping you. Do you want to know why? Because he’s been in your situation before. He knows what planetwide crisis is like. He wanted to help, he wanted to be on the front lines.”

“Well why hasn’t he done anything?” A member of the crowd fires back, and Bones sends them a glare that’s phaser potent.

“What the hell d’you mean, why hasn’t he done anything?” Bones doesn’t give the other person time to answer, letting his anger flow over into his words.

“Do y’all realize just what he’s done for all of you so far? He’s moved the surviving population of your entire settlement, gotten you all to this godforsaken evacuation point, and did it all while he was injured! That’s right! Our good captain is injured! Broke his damn wrist trying to help a girl up from where she’d fallen down to, but he’s hidden it from you. Didn’t want you to think he was weak, especially if he complained over the pain from a broken wrist!” Bones’ shot another glance back at Jim. The captain’s face was a mask, completely neutral as his eyes scanned over the crowd.

"He might’ve gotten us all out here to the extraction point, but he still hasn’t gotten us up to your ship! All he has to do is call in on that fancy communicator of his and have us beamed up! He can’t even do that much!" Another faceless member of the crowd calls out to Bones, acting as if they’ve just presented an infallible argument.

"The transporters are malfunctioning at the moment." Bones’ voice is slightly lower in volume now, his mind busy questioning the integrity of the transporters in general. How the hell is he (or anyone, for that matter) supposed to trust something that scatters your atoms when it breaks down all the time? But now’s not the time for distractions. He’s meant to be setting the crowd straight. "Our chief engineer promises that they’ll be back online within the hour. Until then, how about y’all stop blaming Jim and start thinking about all the nasty things you’ve had to say today? I might just be a simple doctor, but I know when someone’s crossed a line. And y’all crossed about five."

He steps back from his position in front of Jim, mumbling something about biting the feeding hand, and the crowd goes deathly silent. There are no murmurs of hateful words, no glares, just people standing around and staring with stunned looks. It seems that nobody expected to get told off like a group of three year olds.

While the crowd is left to ponder exactly what they’ve just been told, Bones sidles up to Jim and gives him a smile.

"Not gonna let anyone talk down about my good captain."

Jim grins about as weakly as possible.

"Thanks, Bones."

"Any time, kid. Gotta protect your honour. That’s what boyfriends do, you know." He pulls the younger man into a hug, holding him there. Bones won’t let go, not until he’s required to. Jim practically melts into him, glad to have someone as sturdy as Bones on his side.

"I love you."

"Love you too. Just remember that when I’m repairin’ that broken wrist of yours, you hear?"

"Will do."


End file.
